The tenth T20 World Cup is the latest ICC event to be disrupted by a stand-off between India and its neighbours. Suresh Menon, former Wisden India editor and a long-time observer of the region’s political weather, considers if the game really is too big to fail.
This article appears in issue 94 of Wisden Cricket Monthly, available to buy now.
What would Asian politicians do without cricket? When India beat Pakistan in the final of the Asia Cup last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted: “#Operation Sindoor on the games field. Outcome is the same – India wins! Congrats to our cricketers.”
Operation Sindoor was the military operation launched by India in May following a Pakistani terror attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir, which resulted in civilian casualties.
Some years ago, the government in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu decided that no Sri Lankan player would be allowed to play in the IPL in Chennai, in solidarity with the Tamils being ill-treated in that country. Muttiah Muralitharan, a Tamil from Sri Lanka who played for Chennai Super Kings said this was “sad for cricket”.
Recently, the Board of Control for Cricket in India asked Kolkata Knight Riders to sack Bangladesh’s Mustafizur Rahman after the bowler had been picked for the IPL. It followed a tweet by a member of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party who saw a delicious opportunity to strike at both Bangladesh and a prominent Muslim at home, the Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan, in the same action. Shah Rukh Khan is the face of KKR, so by the logic of the troll he becomes a traitor for choosing a player from Bangladesh, a troubled country where Hindus were killed in ongoing violence.
Bangladesh retaliated by asking the ICC to shift their World T20 matches out of India in February-March and banned the telecast of the IPL in their country. Board officials insist that the security for their players would be compromised by being in India. The situation is ongoing. [After an ICC board meeting on January 21, the BCB were told Bangladesh would be replaced by another team at the T20 World Cup if they refused to travel to India. The following day, Bangladesh's sports advisor Asif Nazrul reiterated that Bangladesh would not play their World Cup matches in India.]
India and Pakistan have a special relationship. Each is a convenient ‘other’, carrying political, religious, cultural, economic, social and sporting baggage over nearly eight decades after the countries were partitioned by the British. Politicians on either side keep the pot boiling. And there’s no greater potboiler than cricket.
If an ICC tournament is being hosted by either country, the game of ‘will-they-come-won’t-they-come’ gains momentum. Television whips up emotions, cricket boards practice brinkmanship and politicians claim credit when a happy compromise is reached. The novelist R K Narayan once said that India is a country that lives in the eleventh hour. Nowhere is this clearer than in cricket relations with Pakistan.
India had championed the entry of Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh into international cricket. For long Afghanistan used India as ‘home’ ground because of the political situation there. But cricket diplomacy cuts both ways – it divides nations as easily as it strengthens ties.
The physics Nobel laureate Richard Feynman once famously said, “If you are not completely confused by quantum mechanics, you do not understand it.” You could say the same about Asian cricket. Sometimes the politics affects cricket, at other times the cricket affects politics.
Pakistan know that regardless of how the naysayers feel, India will find a way to play them, even if they themselves have to swallow various insults, from shifts in venues to ignored handshakes. India captain Suryakumar Yadav refused to shake hands with his Pakistani counterpart at the Asia Cup. Later captains of India’s Under-19 and women’s teams copied the cringeworthy behaviour.
When India refused to accept the Asia Cup from the chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board in his role as the President of the Asian Cricket Council, he took the trophy to Pakistan while the Indians celebrated with a replica.
Pakistan’s cricket can’t do without India. India see Pakistan as a cog in television’s most profitable rivalry. The policy might not be the most honest, but it is lucrative.
With so much apparent uncertainty in Asia, therefore, it is easy to imagine that cricket is on a precipice in the region, that internecine cricketing battles will destroy the game here. That will not happen, and for some very good reasons, starting with television.
Cricket, a game played over 22 yards is now one that lives in 22 inches (and more, on television) or even half that number, in centimetres, on phones. No one is particularly fussed about where India play Pakistan or if Bangladesh don’t play in India so long as the matches are available on their screens.
The television rights for the IPL were sold for 6.2 billion dollars while those for home internationals brought in another 721 million. ICC tournaments fetch three billion. Cricket in Asia is too big to fail.
After both India and Pakistan failed to qualify for the knockout of the 2007 World Cup, thus depriving television of its biggest payday, the ICC has contrived to put them in the same group in later tournaments. This raises hopes of two matches between them, three if they make it to the final. Asian cricket is important for the other teams too.
For teams in Asia, success on the cricket field is seen as the benchmark of nationhood, patriotism, self-worth, identity and often as compensation for lack of success in other fields. There is belief that even in corrupt societies, a good player will get opportunities. Merit does not guarantee success or even opportunities elsewhere. Naive as it might sound, this is what keeps cricket – and the movie industry – thriving.
Received wisdom is that nearly three quarters of world cricket’s revenue is generated by India. The chairman of the ICC Jay Shah is the son of India’s Home Minister. India’s grip is near-total in the current turn of the wheel.
When Indian cricket sneezes, world cricket catches a cold. Incentive enough, therefore, to keep it healthy.
Follow Wisden for all updates, including live scores, match stats, quizzes and more. Stay up to date with the latest cricket news, player updates, team standings, match highlights, video analysis and live match odds.
